Hyena's Steve Coombs is here with three other team members. "Boisie (Chris Reed) is in Super Street Bike and my brother Paul Coombs and Martin Walker are both in 9.50 bike. We started with four members seven years ago, expanded to ten at one point and are now back at four. It's good fun running as a team and we help each other out. For instance Paul torched his head and had nitrous issues at the Big Bang last weekend and Boisie and I were able to go to his place and put the replacement parts on. We have known each other for 25 years." Steve is competitive this year winning the Thunderball and going two rounds in the Big Bang. "We changed the bodywork from GSXR1100 to GSXR1000 style and this has helped our performance. I would have gone further at the Big Bang but had a bad start after getting water on my boot."

Super Gas racer Jamie King used to run in Pro ET and has owned this Corvette for five years. "It was built by Merv Barnett and I put in a 468 cu in Jeff Bull engine. I came to the Test & Tune a fortnight ago and ran 9.88 but have had problems today and will have to take the sump off to investigate" Jamie runs with.out a throttle stop.

Super Comp racer David James had a close encounter with a pheasant at 150mph. "I had just crossed the finish line and saw a pheasant walking across the shut down area. I couldn't avoid it and hit it head on. The car is not damaged and I have cleaned the feathers off. The car is not running as well as I had hoped because the rear end ratio is wrong. I have a 632 cu in Jeff Bull engine and gained 500hp on the old setup and I was looking to run high sevens but the car is over a second off the pace. Thanks to Chris Isaacs for doing the chassis work and I am looking forward to more seat time."

Super Pro ET racer Bob Doyle is enjoying Super Pro and becoming more competitive. Wife Tracy said "Bob has been racing for 15 years and we've been together for 13 years. We won the last Super ET championship before the class was discontinued so I suppose we are still reigning champions. It is six years since we won an event in Pro ET. We then went into Super Gas which was a wilderness for us. The class was friendly and we qualified well but we found it hard to run well on the pro tree. So we put a nitrous system on and are now running 8.86 on an 8.9 dial-in. We are bracket racers at heart." The team is being helped by Crew Chief "Do Me" Dom and Peter Lane.

Super Mod racer Tim Garlick said "We are trying to get hold of the track. The Big Bang did not go well and Rob Smallworth beat us. Today we ran 7.74 but need to get into the 7.6s to be competitive. We uprated the clutch as we went through it on the first run and then the conditions went the other way. It is the only affordable heads up eliminator that feeds directly into pro classes."

Pro ET racer Joe Williams is in the Marina Van With No Name which he is sharing driving duties with Dave Russell (right). "I built the car in the eighties for Dave to run it in Rover then Phil Toppin raced it in Street Eliminator while we were building a Pop. I then built the 540cu in engine with 8/71 blower and we decided to put the car together. Andy Frost helped with the gearbox and John Webster with the suspension tuning. Although the engine was built to run methanol we use 99 octane pump gas. Dave has run a 9.2 shutting off at 1000ft. Dave and Joe will be alternating drives. Thanks go to Andy at Phoenix Air & Sea Cargo for sponsorship.

9.50 Bike racer Jake Mechaell won the Eurodragster.com/Speedflow Perfect Light award, the first time a bike has achieved this. "I crewed for my father Clive on his fuel altered and funny car. I have a 9.50 bike to learn about racing and I hope to move up to a nitro class. The bike is a GSXR which has been lowered and stretched with a stock engine. It's maintenance free apart from changing the oil every other run. I like the large fields which gives a competitive challenge. I first started in run what you brungs in April and ran seven passes then did a 9.56 at the SCR Test & Tune. I never thought I could run a Perfect Light though." As Clive is running at some events over Summer Jake will next be racing at the end of season National Championship events.

Pro ET racer Carla Pittau suffered a broken axle at the Easter Thunderball and found a broken snap ring. "If the fragments from this lodge themselves in the gears it could cause a lock-up which is what led to the car spinning at the top end last year. I identified the problem occuring when we were reversing. So we have taken the TH350 gearbox out and are putting our spare in to be safe." The picture shows Rick McGann investigating the suspect gearbox.

8.50 Bike racer Chris Jones said "I have a new bike with Motec AMS parts to control the blower better as it was blowing the tyres off. The engine is fresh off Mark Fisher's dyno and we put it back together by 10pm last night. Thanks to Sean Mills for his help. The work has paid off - our first run was a 9.2 and then 8.7 but on the third I missed a gear and shut off." The bike has an inscription from history. "When Constantine I was invading Rome in 325AD he looked at the sky and saw letters that said "By this sign you will be victorious."

Pro ET racer Mick Howling has had to withdraw after damage to the bearings on Grumpy's Dodge. "The pick up from the oil pump failed and the bearings became scored. But the good news is the damage could have been much worse. I noticed the oil pressure disappeared and switched the engine off immediately so all we need to do is mend the oil pump and put new bearings on." The PMR dragster has smoke out of the headers arising from the Evac oil evacuation system.

B&Q Automotive/LA Racing Parts Street Eliminator Mark Todd is racing a first generation Pontiac Firebird which keeps a very clean stock appearance in spite of a twin turbo small block engine pushing out 1400hp. "The car was built by John Sleath, who also prepared the engine, in 2005-6. We ran a best of 9.1 last year and have new heads and turbos, with boost controller, for this year. "We ran it easy and rich on the first pass and still ran a 9.2, so we will be disappointed if we don't leave here with an eight second timeslip." Mark is self sponsored and helped this weekend by John Sleath, Mike Lacey who is taking a sabbatical from racing and Paul Houston. Mark runs drag radials which suit the wheelarch dimensions and was pleased with the driveability of the car on the cruise.

Super Modified racer Rob Smallworth said "We had a new short motor fitted over the winter with new crank rods and pistons by I.C.E. who did a great job. We had a problem with the rear bearing last year and the new parts seem to have resolved that. Easter was our first meeting and we were careful to pull the oil filter out to ensure there was no dust; we ran a 7.70 which was pleasing. At the Big Bang we also did well and got by Tim Garlick. With three meetings in four weeks it is important to keep the parts in top condition. At the Big Bang the engine spat back through the carbs and split the inlet manifold which meant that we missed the second round. We patched the problem up but there was no time to get a replacement part."

Kistie is showing off the Alien team's new crew shirts. The Dodge Nitro tow vehicle has also be chromed afresh. The engine which runs on Methanol has the crew chief Chris Coleman's name on the rocker cover. The crew has been supplemented for this year by Nigel Turner who is taking a year out of racing in order to get married with the honeymoon set for Las Vegas and Pomona.

We first met the Cambridge Apple Store's Super Pro mascot Concierge Bear escaping from Mark Flavell's roof hatch at the Easter Thunderball. Dressed in a cunning Batman disguise, Concierge has found a suitable viewing position tied to the Alien roll cage. John said "We will be bringing Hang 'Em High out next season. All the work is done apart from the engine and gearbox. The body comes from 1975 and was also used on Teacher's Pet. When we stripped the body we found eleven layers of paint on it before we got to the original blue. We kept an area of the old scheme to show what we found. John has eleven more passes to make before he reaches the milestone of 1,000 runs in qualifying and competition. "You could call it 250 miles of going down the track", he added.

Super Comp racer Steve Wells ran a 9.053/143.97 to be qualified no. 4 after the second round of qualifying. He said "We have a data logger and have been using it to tune the clutch. I didn't realise it but the clutch was slipping a lot in top gear. The result is the Rover-powered Anglia pickup now within reach of the eight second bracket. "It wouldn't go straight in qualifying at Easter and adjusted the suspension which improved the handling and we ran a 9.18. The times are without the benefit of full blower boost. We destroyed everything after the engine kicked a rod out at the Main Event, so the new motor is stroked with a stock bore which should make it stronger." Malcolm and Marcie Motler are crewing for Steve this weekend after discovering a needle roller bearing had come off requiring a strip down to locate it; he hopes to be back out in Super Comp at the Summer Nationals.

Super Modified racer Craig Gibbs now has an expanded team with Adrian Spencer as Crew Chief, Dave Clarkson as clutch man, Darren Herbert-White on Nitrous and startline duties with Tina Gibbs helping staging duties. Marie Herbert-White is also on the team. Adrian Spencer is not here on Saturday as he is celebrating wife Becky's 40th Birthday but his absence for a day has not hurt the team's improved performance too much as they ran a 7.72 for the no.2 spot in good air that favours the normally aspirated runners.

Pro ET racer Chris Hodgkins' dad Nick is crew chief, "Which means I get breakfast", he said. "Over the winter we changed the front end to improve staging and now run Bonneville-style front wheels rather than spokes which could be missed by the beam particularly on a sunny day. We also changed the steering wheel and rack which makes it easier to turn the car in the space available. We got a Tag-Heuer computer over the winter months which tries to predict the car's performance based on entering data for previous runs including weather and atmospheric conditions. On the last run we went nine thousandths quicker than predicted. We are hopeful of a win one of these days; the best so far is runner-up at the 2007 Open Sport Nationals. It's not if but when."

Pro ET racer Tig Napier has a new paint scheme and interior trim from Chipping Norton Body Shop. "Last weekend we had the engine and gearbox out and only managed to run it for ten minutes." The car ran better than expected when a check-out pass on an 11.99 dial in turned into a wheelying launch and a 10.4 after backing off at the eighth. "We freshened the engine up over the winter and our best is a 9.71." Tig is joined by Mark Chitty as new crew chief. Mark spectated for a couple of years and has now graduated to drag racing after doing mechanical work in circuit racing. Tig remarked that a woodpecker is adorned on the sump in recognition of engine builder Woody's Race Engines.

Super Gas and Super Comp racer Jon Morton came close to winning both Super Gas and Super Comp at the Thunderball. "It was a great race against Brian Pateman but he just edged me in SuperComp. My sponsor from Firecrest Services Ltd will be here tomorrow and I thank him for his support." Dan Page had a problem when firing the engine from cold in the first round of Pro ET and then being asked to shut off for a delay on track. "I think there is a wiring problem." Dan has a TAG weather station for predicting the car's times but the track is the unknown quantity with these machines; the number of cars breaking out in Pro ET in the first session (ten out of sixteen) indicates the track is better than the teams were expecting.

8.50 Bike racer Andy Haley says his machine is basically his 9.50 Hayabusa with an added nitrous system. "My best without nitrous was 9.36 and this has improved to 8.97 with gas. I'm using a small BTC dry nitrous kit which Paul Watson of DSD has helped install; it's very smooth and I like the extra power. The 8.50 bike class is anything goes in terms of slicks, wheelie bars and engine mods; for me it's a great steppping stone to Super Street where competitive times are in the mid to high sevens." Andy has been drag racing bikes for seventeen years, of which twelve years was in 9.90 or 9.50 bike and was the first 9.50 bike racer to run a perfect 9.500.